Lady Dimitrescu is a milestone for this designer
Is the portrayal of Lady Dimitrescu in “Resident Evil Village” a step in the right direction for the gaming industry? A 3D character designer says yes, but interjects that it is ultimately only a small step.
Lady Dimitrescu from the latest Resident Evil part is a short time after the game was released a popular motif for internet memes become. Xavier Coelho-Kostolny is now arguing on Twitterthat the giant vampire could be one of the most important game characters of the last couple of decades. Coelho-Kostolny himself specializes in the creation of 3D characters and has worked in the past on “Marvel’s Spider-Man” and “Ratched and Clank: Rift Apart”, among others.
Although Coelho-Kostolny does not consider Lady Dimitrescu to be a particularly complex or interestingly written character, he nevertheless considers her visual presentation to be remarkable. In his opinion, Lady Dimitrescu’s design differs significantly from the way women are usually represented in video games. The gigantic vampire woman is also highly sexualized in her portrayal, but she is much older than in many other big games. “Sexualized characters in other games are usually designed to look like they’re in their late teens to early 20s,” says Coelho-Kostolny.
Even in the fairly neutral lighting of the scanning stage, you can see that Stefanie Joosten’s very slight nasolabial fold has been smoothed out for Quiet’s model.
This is common practice, and meant to make female characters look more youthful and beautiful.
– Xavier (@ xavierck3d) May 11, 2021
The age is also clearly shown on the 3D model. “Even in her neutral pose, Lady Dimitrescu has visible facial wrinkles and a distinct nasolabial fold. These are things that you just don’t see in most female game characters – even if they are pretty old, ”argues Coelho-Kostolny. In his work, he himself was repeatedly instructed to remove wrinkles from the faces of female characters so that they look younger.
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According to Coelho-Kostolny, Lady Dimitrescu also differs significantly from the norm with her size, since female characters in video games usually have a comparatively small body size. “Since she is almost twice the size of some other well-known characters, the developers weren’t afraid to bypass the typical portrayal of a female woman in a video game,” writes Coelho-Kostolny.
Sexualization of female characters remains a problem in video games
Coelho-Kostolny on Twitter cannot completely convince everyone with his assessment of Lady Dimitrescu. “There are a lot of reactions to her, and I like her too. But I don’t feel comfortable with the idea that she’s a particularly progressive character design just because she’s a sexualized older character, ”interjects game designer Jennifer Scheurle, for example. The illustrator Olga Drebas also agrees: “Lady Dimitrescu is a step forward in the portrayal of women in games, but she also has a lot of almost caricature Freudish features that almost look like an allusion to 4chan board fetishes. “
Coelho-Kostolny also agrees and writes to Scheurle: “You are 100 percent right! There are still a lot of things to criticize about her presentation and how she represents some really fucked up parts of the game industry and gamer culture. ” because she is a horror villain, Coelho-Kostolny answers quite pessimistically: “In my opinion, almost certainly. I don’t think most people in game development are ready or mature enough to make an older woman who is confident about her sexuality the main character or protagonist. “
